The Prime Directive
by masonryan
Summary: Just a fic about the Twilight style of vampires...may or may not eventually include characters from the actual series. A young vampire tries to balance love, his former human family, and the need for blood. Review if you'd like to read more :)
1. Chapter 1

Chapter One

"Going to see your folks again?" Cecilia asked me lightly, careful to keep a note of disapproval out of her voice. I detected it anyway; any time my family came up, it was there. I reminded myself to be patient with her. The disapproval came from her caring about me. She knew it hurt me to visit my family, and she didn't understand why I tortured myself.

"Something like that," I muttered as I tossed on my overcoat. It was a chilly night, and even though I didn't need a coat to keep me warm, I would have looked out of place without it. Cecilia had worked very hard to keep the two of us above the suspicion of the people we shared our city with. No easy task - the people of New Orleans were a suspicious bunch by nature. A city full of grifters, scam artists, pickpockets, liars and thiefs has a way of setting the locals' range of perception up a few notches from the American norm.

I turned to her, and I caught the look of concern in her eyes before she was able to hide it. It softened whatever was left of my heart. I smiled my most winning smile and said, "I'll be fine. They'll be fine. I'll be back before sunrise. Don't worry about me, okay?"

She got up from the easy chair by our fireplace with an ease and liquidity that was graceful, even by vampire standards. She glided across the room and took my face in her small, delicate-looking hands, but I could feel the strength in those hands buzzing beneath the surface of her skin. She looked deep into my eyes with hers, and I noted that they were more black than red. She'd need to hunt soon. "Asking me not to worry is like asking me to empty out the ocean with a bucket, you silly man," she said, but her voice was soft and fragile even as her eyes blazed. "You may as well ask me not to love you."

"I love you too, Cecilia. You know I do. You also know I have to do this."

She released my face and sighed, and her breath was sweet and somehow minty, with a hint of citrus. I inhaled it deeply, trying to infuse it into my own body as I always did. "I know you do. I don't know why you do, but its okay. Do you want me to come along?"

She always asked, and I was always impressed at the courage behind that question. She was offering to go to a secluded place where humans lived, where no one would hear the screams if...something happened. She made the offer while she was thirsty. It was a thing no human could understand; the implied promise to resist our most basic instinct, to ignore our prime directive, in order to help me do something she didn't agree with in the first place.

"No, my love. I appreciate the offer more than you'll ever know, but no thank you." I noted her dark eyes again and said, "Perhaps you should hunt while I'm gone. You could use it, I think."

She shook her head without really considering my suggestion, just as I'd never really considered her offer to go with me. "I'll wait for you, Mason. You know I'll always wait for you." She glided back to her place beside the fire, stopping to pluck a book at random from the wall-mounted bookcase.

I started to go, but it seemed as if there were something else. It seemed like something was being left unsaid, but whatever it was eluded me. I instead settled for my well-worn farewell. "I'll be back before you can miss me."

Her lips quirked, but her eyes didn't leave her dog-eared copy of The Iliad. "Doubtful, since I already do. Be safe."

My own lips tweaked into a smile at that. There wasn't any danger the night could hold for one such as myself. "I'll try." I slipped through the front door and into the street.

The sounds of revelry carried to my finely-tuned ears from seven blocks over, on Bourbon Street, but my feet took me in the opposite direction. I walked several blocks, and the streets became less cared-for in proportion to the worsening condition of the houses that dotted them. People, predators in their own rights, stood in front of many of those buildings. Most were selling drugs and looking for people to prey on, but none approached me. I did not belong; I was a white face in a black neighborhood, well-dressed by their standards. It always surprised me that no one ever tried to victimize me, but I supposed many of the people out at this hour were more animal than human, in many respects. Their senses were finely tuned, and something about the way I looked, or moved, or even smelled warned these would-be predators that they were in the presence of a predator higher on the food chain than they. No one so much as catcalled me. The streets of the Ninth Ward went silent when I walked them.

I soon came to the edge of the city. My feet squelched in the soggy ground. New Orleans was a city that was always sinking, and I'd reached the edge of where nature was trying to take the land back. The night was ink; there was a full moon, but dark clouds hid it. They hid /me/. I dashed forward with a speed that would have been impossible for a human to understand and launched myself into the towering stump of a dead cypress.

I launched from this perch to another, and another. I traveled over the swamp in this way, never touching the water below. My senses caught everything. I saw the alligators below, lazily cruising, hoping to find a meal. I saw the birds of prey roosting in the canopy above. I smelled a thousand different animals...the plants, decaying and living...I smelled the mud and the dirt and the clean air above. I flitted through the cypress swamp like a ghost in the night.

As I traveled, I just existed. I subconsciously enjoyed being free to move how nature - or something - had intended me to. On the surface, I steeled myself against seeing my family.

My creation was a mystery to me. I have no memory of it. Others of my kind say it is a painful affair, but I don't remember. They say its rare for one of us to retain no memories of our past life. I went that way for a long time. A chance encounter with a human in the city I shared with Cecilia changed everything for me.

When I saw the girl, it was as if a whole, previously-unused part of my brain had lit up. When my gaze had settled on the girl in the shop on Rampart Street, I knew instantly that she had been my sister. My younger sister - even though I was frozen in time at twenty years old and the girl in the shop was roughly twenty-five, she was still my younger sister.

Lillie. The memory of her had set off a chain reaction in my memory center. My older brother, John. My mother. My father, who had been long dead when I'd ceased to be human. Our farm in southwestern Mississippi. All of it.

I had run away from my sister. A split second after realizing who she was, the urge to kill her had been almost overpowering. The urge sickened me beyond belief. It was beyond my ability to understand, though I'd tried in the months that followed. Was I angry at her for reminding me who I'd been? That I'd been human? I just didn't know, and the not knowing scared me.

Over time, I'd been able to convince myself that I would not - /could/ not - ever do her harm. Mind over matter. So in a dangerous experiment, I'd gone to the old farm.

I'd kept my distance, watching them through the windows of the house. Blessedly, the urge that had nearly overtaken me on Rampart Street seemed to be nonexistent. I listened to their easy conversation, full of love and care for one another. Through my eavesdropping, I'd learned that my family had fallen on hard times. They were being pressured by the bank to sell their farm, but my mother wouldn't have it. It would kill my father all over again, she said.

Fortunately for them, I could help.

I had found someone's copy of The Catcher in the Rye in the barn, and I'd left the six hundred dollars I'd had on me inside of it. When I returned the next week, the money was gone, but the book was still there. I'd smiled and left three thousand more.

Every week, the book was still there, and every week, the money was gone. It made me happy. It made me feel like even though I was dead to them, I was still of use. The bank stopped sending its squeeze-men out to the farm. The livestock population grew. The leaky roof was fixed. John started an extension on the house. These things brought me pleasure.

That was when I began to fantasize about a reunion. I knew it was impossible. Cecilia had educated me about the rules of our kind, and what happens to those who break them. Knowing better, I couldn't help picturing meeting them all over again. Telling them I was alive, and that I was fine. Taking credit for giving them the money they needed and giving them more.

The more I indulged in my selfish fantasies, the more depressed I became. Having the power to do something I absolutely could not do tormented me. I did my best to hide it from Cecilia, but even an extremely dull mate would have been able to see it. And Cecilia was anything but dull.

Even so, I could not stop going to the farm. I couldn't stop helping my family as I destroyed myself.

I'd timed my arrival to be the night's deepest existence, roughly three-thirty. My reason for this was in the interest of self-preservation; if they were asleep when I arrived, it made it easier to leave.

I stole into the barn and smiled as I picked up the copy of The Catcher in the Rye. I'd since learned that it was Lillie's; the pages held her scent. When I opened it to slide in the cash I'd brought, a slip of paper tried to fall to the floor. I caught it and read it in the total darkness.

Mason,

I know its you doing this. Everyone thinks you're dead, but I know you're not. Who else would sneak a fortune in cash into my book every week? Whatever you've done, whoever you are, I am your sister and I love you. Please stop leaving money. We don't need it anymore and I don't want it. All I want is you, big brother. PLEASE SEE ME. I won't tell anyone else you're alive if you don't want me to - they wouldn't believe it without seeing you, anyway. I love you and I miss you and I want you back.

Lillie


	2. Chapter 2

Chapter Two

"Mason, you can't see her," Cecilia said. Her voice had a hard edge that was unusual for her. It was clear she thought my indiscretion regarding my family had gone on long enough.

"I know," I replied softly, and I did. I wasn't being fair to my sister, who thought I was alive and couldn't concieve what I actually was. I wasn't being fair to Cecilia, who loved me and hated seeing me suffer. And I wasn't being fair to myself.

When they'd needed the money badly, it had made me feel good to be able to help them. But they were stabilized now. I'd given them the tool they needed to make the farm successful again, and they were using it well. So why couldn't I leave well enough alone? Why couldn't I just move on with my life and let them move on with theirs?

As if she were reading my mind, Cecilia said, "Why don't we move, Mason? It will be easier for you when they're not a stone's throw away. Let's just pick up and move."

"Move where?" I asked listlessly. "You've made a home for yourself here. You've been here for sixty years. Why should you have to move because of me?"

"I made a home for /us/ here," she corrected. "My life was rudderless before you came along. The question is why /wouldn't/ I move? I'd do anything for you. Its a small sacrifice."

The idea of picking up stakes and moving was unacceptable to me. Whether it was to satisfy my own sick addiction or the unwillingness to disrupt Cecilia's life, I couldn't be sure. "No. We're staying here," I said firmly.

She ran her hands through her long, brown hair. "This is unhealthy, Mason. I'm worried. It disturbs me that you even brought the note," she gestured to the end table where she'd set my sister's letter after reading it. "It indicates an intention to act on it."

"What?" I asked, genuinely surprised. "No it doesn't. I brought the note because it would have been pointless to leave both it and the money. She would have known I read it anyway."

She knelt in front of where I sat, forcing me to look her in the eye. "She doesn't know its you, Mason! She's hoping and wishing its you, but she doesn't /know!/ You're still leaving money when they don't need it anymore. You're still making the excuse to go there and be close to them. The truth is that you want this, you've always wanted this, and you can't have it!" She stood and spun unbelievably quickly. With her back to me, she said, "I'd give you anything. I'd give you the world. But you cannot have this, Mason!"

"I know!" I shouted, and she spun back to face me. Shock was clear on her face; I'd never raised my voice to her before. But it felt like my head was on fire. I wasn't in control of myself. "You're telling me things I already know!"

She quickly smoothed her face into an impassive mask. "Do you know it? Do you really?" she asked calmly. "Your actions say otherwise. You need to let them go, Mason. For you, for me, and for them...you need to let them go."

My head cleared as I realized what I'd done. I'd hurt Cecilia, perhaps badly. I rose and crossed the den, taking her in my arms. "You are the most important thing in the world to me, dear heart," I whispered into her ear as she buried her face in my shoulder. "I'm sorry about this. I really am. I don't know what's wrong with me."

She raised her head and kissed me with a desperation that was unlike her. "Please, Mason," she whispered against my lips. "Please stop this."

At that moment, I would have promised her everything. Anything. "I will."

Her eyes filled with hope. "Do you mean it? You'll just be happy with me and let them go on with their lives?"

"Yes," I replied. And to prove my intention to do that, I gave her a reminder that I knew what I was. "We still have an hour before daybreak. Let's hunt."

She smiled happily. "Yes. Let's."


	3. Chapter 3

Chapter Three

As Cecilia wandered through the seedier end of Bourbon Street, I followed along on the rooftops.

She had affected a drunken stumble and seemingly wasn't paying attention to her surroundings. She was the perfect bait. Her out-on-the-town clothing revealed plenty of her skin, which was flawless, and the color of coffee lightened with a lot of milk. She was barely five feet tall and built very slightly. To human eyes, she looked beautiful, weak, and very drunk.

To human eyes, anyway.

She stopped in front of a dark alley, seemed to consider it for a long time, and then staggered into it. I saw two men watching her, and one elbowed the other. They followed her, shooting sidelong glances, making sure no one was paying attention. Making sure there were no witnesses.

They entered the alley and signed their own death warrants. Cecilia was very practiced at this game, and she stayed far enough ahead to be out of easy reach, but close enough to be followed. When she deemed she was far enough from Bourbon Street, she sat down on a milk crate. The men approached her, and one of them said, "Hey, you know you shouldn't be walking alone this late at night, right?"

"Yeah. Something could happen to a pretty little thing like you," the second chimed in.

"He's right," said the first guy. "All /sorts/ of things could happen."

The second moved to block her from moving deeper into the alley. Cecilia stood up and looked at the first one. All pretense of drunkeness left her, but the creeps seemed to not notice. "What sorts of things?" she asked evenly.

"I'll put it this way. If you don't fight, this will go a lot easier," Creep number one said.

"Hell, you might even have some fun. If you don't fight," Creep two.

Cecilia stepped toward the first one. She was still moving slowly, human speed. I smiled slightly; she intended to have fun with these two. I agreed. Their kind made me sick. "What if I told you the same thing? What if I told you that it would hurt you a lot less if you didn't struggle?" she purred seductively.

The first guy shot a glance at the second, confused. This wasn't how this was supposed to go. "What are you talking about?"

The second guy said nervously, "Look at her eyes, Jay. What's wrong with her eyes?"

"What am I talking about?" Cecilia asked retorically as she paced. "I'm talking about the fact that you're in the last few seconds of your pathetic little lives. I suggest you get on your scuzzy knees and pray to whoever it is that listens to the prayers of human trash."

The second guy had blocked himself from the only escape by placing himself between the dead end and Cecilia. The first guy was starting to edge back toward Bourbon Street, and I could tell from his body language that he was getting ready to run.

I dropped from the roof soundlessly into the alley, blocking his escape. He turned to leave the alley, apparently shaken from the way his intended victim had been talking to him, and found his path blocked by me. "Stay a while," I smiled at him. "You were eager to have some fun a few minutes ago. So let's have some fun."

I launched myself and hit him at the same time Cecilia took down the second guy. They didn't have time to so much as whimper. I pressed my knee into my victim's chest. I could feel his lungs spasming as he tried to pull in a breath to scream, but the pressure I was putting on them wouldn't allow it. I put my face close to his and took in the almost-comical expression of extreme fear. "This is what the people you've hurt felt like. Everyone you've ever victimized felt the way you do right now. And this is your payback for your crimes."

I sunk my teeth into his neck, severing his carotid artery and jugular vein as easily as a seamstress would snip a bothersome thread. I formed a seal around the wound with my lips and drew his life force into myself. The feeling was ecstacy. As the blood drained from him and into me, there was a high, a sense of fulfillment, that could never be described. It was so much more than sustenance. It was elation; it was total victory.

All too soon, the body was drained. I felt no remorse; this man would have raped and robbed my mate, left to his own devices. Cecilia was standing over her victim, dabbing at her mouth with a hankerchief in a civilized way. "Disgusting creatures," she said mildly.

"The world is better off," I agreed. I looked at the sky and saw that it was rapidly lightening, our sign to retreat home. "Should we dump them?" I asked, thinking of the nearby swamp where the alligators would take care of the evidence.

She sighed, as if I'd suggested a chore that wasn't really necessary. "I suppose. We'd have to hunt somewhere else for a few weeks if we don't."

I pulled her close and kissed her. "I'll take care of it."

She smiled. "Do you mind?"

I shook my head and smiled back. "I'll be home in a few minutes. I love you, Cici."

"I love you too, Mason."

Author's Note: I hope you're enjoying the story so far! I see from the traffic stats that people are reading; I wouldn't know if you're enjoying or not, because I haven't gotten any reviews. If you'd like to see this finished, please let me know what you think. It's not a threat, it's just fair warning...without any motivation, this story will probably die an early and ignonimous death =( so please, take the time to leave a short review with your thoughts! Thank you in advance!


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